Entertainment
3 September, 2024
Kids exploring artistic skills
CAIRNS’ children will get to discover their Picasso from within these school holidays with the Cairns Art Gallery school holiday classes where kids ages four to 14 will play with air-dry clay, pastel portraits, spider dioramas and more.
Fun, creativity and art will go hand in hand these school holidays as the Cairns Art Gallery has launched their popular school holiday kids’ classes where experienced local artists will help children explore the artist within with workshops catered especially for them.
The classes begin from September 17 and will go until September 26.
Cairns Art Gallery manager Kelly Jaunzems said this was an opportunity for kids to have fun and learn.
“Art is very important for children, it’s been scientifically proven that it’s, not only good for creativity, but art also helps critical thinking,” she said.
“These workshops are pretty popular and tend to sell out fast, especially right at the beginning and end of the school holidays, so we do recommend for parents to book as soon as possible.
“For these September holiday workshops we really focused on the exhibitions that we have on, such as works from Margaret Olley, so we have some still life classes based on her still life paintings.
“We also got this incredible exhibition of tiny spiders from the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney, so we have some spider dioramas and articulated spider puppets. We really try to focus on the exhibitions we’re showing.”
Seasoned gallery artists Keelie Nicholls, Jamie Lee Simpson and Amanda Rowen will be running the workshops which include oil pastel landscapes, ink still-life drawings, spider dioramas, chalk pastel portraits, air-dry clay, spider puppets and chalk pastel fairytale landscapes.
“These workshops are for small groups because we’d like for all of the kids to have one-on-one time with the teachers,” Ms Jaunzens said.
“For our classes ages 9-14 the maximum number of students is 12 and for our younger students a maximum of 10.
“The classes range from $18 to $25.
“All kids have creativity but sometimes at these classes it does surprise me the quality of the work that they produce.
“I would encourage people to sign up for the classes. Art is not just fun, but an important tool to teach the kids to observe the world around them and develop critical thinking which then branches to other areas like math and science. Art has lots of benefits.”
To book the kids holiday classes, visit https://bit.ly/3XjeL4M
